


let's talk about love, let's talk about you

by jisungracha



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Detective AU, M/M, Multi, mark and yukhei are stupid and jaemin goes through it, soft shit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-12
Updated: 2018-12-12
Packaged: 2019-09-16 18:28:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16959252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jisungracha/pseuds/jisungracha
Summary: "Do you guys have any leads?""Um... he must be pretty good at stealing."(lumarkmin detective au where jaemin joins a detective agency and is stuck with yukhei and mark as partners)





	let's talk about love, let's talk about you

Jaemin never hesitated; he didn’t think twice about signing up for law classes in high school. Nor did his hand waver as he signed his name on the application for an internship at a local law firm. 

But when he actually found himself in front of the doors, he stopped himself from turning the door knob. He was definitely interested in law, and he definitely couldn’t throw away this chance. At 18, he was the youngest person to even be offered an internship at the law firm. So what stopped him now?

It was hardly an intimidating building; Jaemin had heard that Mr.Lee had just bought out the place recently. The walls still beared the wear and tear from it’s previous owner. And there was a lot of wear and tear. If not for the poorly made sign with the words ‘LEE AGENCY’ written in marker on it, Jaemin might have thought he got the wrong place. He’s still convinced that might be the case with how sloppy the handwriting is- did Mr.Lee have a really young son or something?

He blamed his hesitation on the weird sign and moved on, finally turning the door knob in front of him.

“Hey! You Jaemin? You are, right?” A booming voice greets Jaemin as soon as he gets the door open. How did Mr.Lee get about 30 years younger overnight? And how’d he get so… wow this guy was attractive. His blonde hair was styled like a models… wait, who was he? Mr.Lee had explicitly told Jaemin to go to his office first.

“Uh- yeah, I am. I need to see Mr.Lee, so if you could just-“  
“Mark! Jaemin’s here!” Fucker.

Jaemin draws his attention to the sound of something abruptly hitting the floor. He sees a young man with brown hair stand up straight after dropping a box, spilling some of its (luckily not valuable looking) contents.

He takes this time to look around the room a bit more. It was pretty small; there was a front desk, though no one was seated there right now. There were a few chairs and a table on the left side of the room and a hallway on the right.

“Oh! Shit, hey. You here to see my dad right?”  
“If your father is Mr.Lee, then yes.”  
“Yeah! He asked me to take you to his office when you got here.”  
“Are you planning on doing that today?” Jaemin meant it in more of a teasing way but realized it sounded pretty asshole-ish. Which was okay, considering that was his other intent.

“Y-yeah! Uh, just follow me.” The attr- loud guy laughs a bit before sitting behind the front desk. If that was his job then why was he just standing in front of the door when Jaemin got there? Speaking of which, why weren’t there other people here working?

He realizes he can ask about that later when he notices Mark had started walking. Ignoring the blonde’s laugh, he eventually reaches the end of the hallway. There’s a single door, labelled with a plaque reading ‘MR.LEE’. Did this guy really think Jaemin couldn’t have found this himself? This was literally a detective agency.

He makes sure to thank him anyways. The young man nods, a smile returning to his face, then heads back down the hallway. Jaemin then steps into the office by himself, after taking a few deep breaths.

“Ah, Na Jaemin! You’re the new intern?”  
“Yes sir.”  
“Oh, don’t be so formal. Mr.Lee will be just fine.”  
“Mr.Lee, then.”  
“There we go! Well, I guess I should go ahead and give you your first assignment huh? Don’t worry too much about this place, Mark can give you a tour later. Not much to see as of right now, anyways.” Jaemin pauses at the name. Was Mark one of the two men he encountered earlier? Mr.Lee seems to notice his confusion and responds quickly. “Mark is my son! He’s working here too, so you’ll be seeing a lot of him.” 

That could be fun.

“Yukhei, the other man you probably saw, is a friend of Mark. He’s a good kid! Honestly, I don’t know that Mark would be very interested in his job if Yukhei wasn’t here to keep him company. With you around, I think he’ll really enjoy it!”  
“Are there not.. other employees?”  
“Well, we’re hiring, but not too many people are interested in detective work. There are more than just Mark and Yukhei, but they’re not around as often. Not to mention, we just started recently!”

“What about the assignment, Mr.Lee?”  
“Ah, yes! It might be kinda big for your first job, but as you know, we’re pretty understaffed here.”  
Jaemin lit up at what he said. He could hardly contain his excitement; a big case, already? Maybe he hit the jackpot with this weird place.

“I can handle it, Mr.Lee! What is it?”  
The man gives a hearty chuckle before responding. “Oh, I believe you! Your application was most impressive… you’ll be studying under Mark and Yukhei, but maybe they could even learn something from you! But for this mission, I want you to learn from them. You have a lot of potential, I can tell. But no matter how talented you are, you still need experience.” Mr.Lee showed a new face to Jaemin as he spoke. Jaemin could tell he seriously cared for his well being, and it made him relax. “So, you don’t mind working under Mark and Yukhei, right?”

How could he say no? He’d practically be throwing the whole job away. Working with Yukhei might not be ideal, but… Jaemin needs to give him another chance. After all, he had only interacted with the man once.

“I don’t mind, no.”  
“Great! For the actual information of the case, I think you should ask Mark about that. You have to get to know your co-workers!” He laughs a bit at himself, then shifts in his chair, the seriousness from earlier easily fading.

“Okay, I will. Thank you for this opportunity, Mr.Lee!” A little ass-kissing never hurt, and Jaemin was genuinely grateful to the older man.

Mr.Lee nodded while displaying a large smile in response then turned his attention to a stack of papers on his desk. Looks like he’ll be busy for a while.

Jaemin walked briskly down the hall, looking out for Mark. He found him leaning on the front desk, chatting with Yukhei.

“...was just embarrassed because he’s the only person here younger than-“ Mark stops speaking when he hears Jaemin approach. As he turns to face him, his eyes widen a bit before he returns back to normal.

“Jaemin! Uh, did you talk to my dad?”  
“Yeah, I did. I’m supposed to get the details of the case from you.” Then I can go home and get some well deserved sleep, Jaemin adds on in his head.

Yukhei grabs a folder off the front desk before walking around it to the side Jaemin and Mark currently occupy. “We’ve been waiting for you! Come on, sit down.” Yukhei directs the two of them to the couch. Jaemin pushes past his hesitation- after all, he’s already gotten this far, and follows after Mark, smiling sweetly. When he takes a seat next to Mark, the other boy flusters and not-so-subtly shifts to the other end of the couch. Was that really all Jaemin had to do to rile him up? Sit a bit too close?

He knew Mark would be fun.

Jaemin doesn’t realize he’s smirking until Yukhei speaks and wipes it off.

“Okay, ready to hear about the case?” He notices Mark’s embarrassed state then and calls him out on it. “Mark! I know you already heard the details about a hundred times, but stick with me!” He’s laughing as he says it, tone light.

“S-sorry. I’m all ears.” He taps his left ear, which is still tinged with red, and it’s the most stupid yet endearing action Jaemin’s ever seen in his 18 years of life. “Alri- hey, Jaemin! Am I losing you too now?!” He’s being dramatic, rubbing fake tears from his eyes and all. It’s stupid and not (maybe it is) endearing.

“Go ahead, I’m listening.” He smiles at him, not wanting to comment on the fake crying.

“Okay! So, the flower shop owner, Qian Kun, reported that someone’s been stealing bouquets nearly every night. He’s tried to stay late to catch the guy, but never saw anyone.”

“Wait, flowers? Doesn’t a bouquet only cost about $40?” Jaemin hadn’t meant to interrupt, but the case was already sounding a bit.. ridiculous. Pretty fitting for the experience he’s had with the agency so far, but Jaemin can dream.

“...How do you know that?” Mark asks slowly, scooting back impossibly further on the couch.  
“Suspicious.” Yukhei adds, scooting back as though there isn’t a large coffee table separating him and Jaemin.

“No, it’s not. That’s like, common knowledge.” Jaemin says, in the sweetest tone he can manage. It doesn’t make them any less suspicious and it’s pretty sad that Jaemin can’t tell if they’re joking anymore or not.

“...Anyways, do you guys have any leads?” Mark leans a bit closer to pick up the file off the table then scoots back again. “Umm.. he must be pretty good at stealing.”

Jaemin is a second away from dropping to his knees and praying before Yukhei speaks up.

“Oh, well we haven’t talked to Kun yet! He’s the owner of the flower shop; Mr.Lee said he has some information. He wanted us to wait for you to join before we got started.”  
“Are we starting now?”  
“Yeah! I’ll let my dad know we’re heading out.”

 

\---------------------------

 

The flower shop is about what he expected. It’s decently sized and it seems like someone put a lot of work into it. He can’t imagine stealing from the place; he’d feel too guilty.

“Hey, these flowers match your shirt!” Jaemin widens his eyes when a tidy bunch of pink azaleas are held to his shirt. He looks up to see Yukhei grinning down at him.

“Yeah..” He gently takes them and focuses on the tiny patterns that cover each flower instead of how his face might also match them.

When Mark calls out to them he puts the flowers back where he sees an empty spot and makes a mental note of where he left them for later.

“Hello! You guys are here for the investigation?” Kun is a lot younger than Jaemin had expected, but his features are gentle and he wears an easy smile. He definitely fits with the atmosphere of the cute flower shop.

“Yeah. If you have time for us, that’d be great.”  
“Of course. I only know that I’m missing bouquets nearly every morning. It usually only happens later in the week, though. I’ve stayed past closing time a few times recently but never saw anything. They must come pretty late.”  
“Have you seen anything suspicious?”  
“Well, this was lying on the ground when I came in one morning. I always clean up before leaving, so it must have been from someone that came after closing.”

Kun hands an expensive looking earring to Mark. It’s in the shape of a cross and it’s so sparkly Jaemin has to blink a few times.

“If they can afford expensive jewelry, why do they steal flowers?” Mark’s eyebrows are raised, fiddling with the earring.

“Maybe the culprit steals jewelry too?”  
“Or it’s a rich person that steals from small shops for fun.” It’s a pretty solid theory, in Jaemin’s opinion.

Kun glances at the earring Mark’s inspecting before speaking again. “I was thinking, the culprit must live pretty close by considering how often they steal. There’s a campus only a few minutes away. It’s a good school too. Maybe the ‘rich culprit’ is hiding away there?”

Jaemin could definitely see the culprit being a rich frat boy.

“Oh, you’re right! Yukhei, Jaemin, we should go to that cafe we passed by!”  
“What?” Even Yukhei looked confused, and Jaemin was glad it wasn’t some weird inside joke.

“The cafe! It’s about lunch time, so there’s probably gonna be some college kids eating there.” “Or are you just hungry?” Jaemin teases, leaning on the counter.

“He’s hungry for justice!” Mark seems to think Yukhei just said something really cool and gives him a high-five.

“Thanks for your help Kun.” Jaemin says it quickly, hoping to give Kun the impression that he’s not leaving the fate of his flower shop into hands that high-five over really bad jokes. Well, he is, but Jaemin’s here too.

“Hey, wait up! Thanks, Kun!” He pushes the door open, hearing two loud pairs of footsteps following behind him.

 

\---------------------------

 

Mark was right- the cafe was nearly overrun with depressed college students. Yukhei managed to snag a table for them, a small one in the corner with four seats. He sits next to Mark again because of course he does.

Yukhei orders a giant platter of various breakfast foods that probably wasn’t meant to be consumed by one person. Mark seems content to munch on the free crackers the waitress gave them. Both of them feel unhealthy in very different ways and Jaemin has to stop himself from scolding them after he looks down at his own cup of coffee ruined by sugar.

“So should we be looking for a college kid with one earring like this?” Mark pulls the earring from his pocket, dangling it in the air. The contrast between the luxurious piece of jewelry on Mark’s oversized sweatshirt made Jaemin stifle a laugh.

“I mean, it seems pretty unrealistic that we’d just run into them but-” A glimmer of silver stops Jaemin in his tracks. “Hey, doesn’t that guy’s earring look like…” This was so stupid that Jaemin wasn’t sure if he was happy he found him or not.

Mark and Yukhei must have followed his gaze and seen the same thing. Jaemin looks back to Mark, as if he knew how to handle this. Maybe he would get up and confront the guy, looking like a cool detective on a crime show. Instead, Mark was typing something on his phone hurriedly.

“What are you doing?” Jaemin whispers it as if the guy wasn’t a few tables away.  
“I’m calling 911.”  
“What?! What do you think our job is?!” Jaemin tries not to look like a bumbling fool in public usually but Mark Lee will do that to a person.

“Find the bad guy then call the cops!”  
“Have you been on a case before??”  
“A couple… we never actually found the culprit though.”  
“Wait, we don’t even know if that guy’s the culprit. We can’t even see his earring that good from here.”  
“Guys, I got this! Mark, give me back-up! Jaemin, watch my food please.”  
“No! I’m coming with you, this isn’t a stealth mission.”  
“It’s not?” Yukhei frowns, looking like a kicked puppy.

“Whatever let’s just… say hello.”  
“You want to be friends with a villain???”  
“I- first of all, he’s just a petty thief. And second of all we don’t know that it’s him! We just have to ask him some questions.” Jaemin takes a second to silently pray that they’ll listen to him.

“Ok, but you go first.” Jaemin is working with children. “Fine” He says, getting up, putting a bit of dramatic flair into the way he pushes his chair back to stand.

He doesn’t say anything about how the two men behind his shoulders make them look even more suspicious. They’d be here all day, if they didn’t get kicked out before that.

He tries to ignore them and focuses on the man with the earring. He dressed really well and had dyed light pink hair. And of course, the single silver earring. He definitely fit the bill of their culprit.

He clears his throat as he approaches the man who had recently sat down with his food. “Um, hello. Could I-” Jaemin glances over his shoulder to see Yukhei crouching down, his eyes peeking over Jaemin’s shoulder. “...we, talk to you for a second?”

He raises an eyebrow but lazily gestures to the seats in front of him. Jaemin says ‘thank you’ before pulling out the seat nearest to him. Mark takes the other seat while Yukhei chooses to stay behind Jaemin. His knees nearly touch the ground now, and his grip on Jaemin’s shoulder is almost painful.

“Thank you. Uh, are we in anyone’s way, sir?” Jaemin asks after noticing the plate of food on his side of the table.

“Nah, he blew me off to see his boyfriend again. And did you just call me ‘sir’? My name’s Yuta.” He doesn’t seem to want to talk more about his friend, as he stabs his muffin viciously with a fork. Jaemin grimaces when Yukhei grips onto his shoulder a bit tighter at the sight.

“Your earring’s cool! Where’d you get it?” Mark is obviously trying to come off as friendly but it’s not hard to miss how fast his leg is shaking, considering it’s shaking the whole table.

“I don’t remember?”  
“Oh.. that’s cool!” Jaemin really needs to intervene. “It looks like you’re missing one though?” On detective shows, the culprit will panic when you mention something related to their crime. But those shows must have been wrong because Yuta just looks really confused.

“Yeah? It’s called fashion? Maybe your friend could use some lessons.” He gives a pointed look at Mark, who doesn’t seem too offended to his credit.

“Is it really fashion or did you just lose one?” Mark questions, looking more suspicious by the minute. His eyebrows are raised and Jaemin isn’t ashamed to admit it’s cute.

“It’s fashion. You don’t think it looks cool?” When he’s met with silence he scoffs and continues. “Why does this matter anyways? Did you wanna steal it but you need the full set or something?”  
“Wouldn’t you know?”  
“Wh- what does that even mean.”  
“It means you’re-” Jaemin reaches a hand up to cover Mark’s mouth before he makes this an even bigger mess.

“Look-” Jaemin moves his hand from Mark’s mouth to his pocket and takes the earring there. He holds it up to Yuta, then continues. “We found this earring and it’s related to um- something important. And the one you’re wearing looks an awful lot like it.”

Jaemin half expected Yuta to pull a Mark and call the police but instead he pulls a ‘panicked culprit from True Crime’.

“What? Where’d you get that?” Yukhei stands up to his full, intimidating height when Yuta says it. “So you did do it!” Yukhei accuses, and Jaemin can see Mark pulling his phone out and typing something.

Yuta furrows his brows and sits up a bit, looking a lot more awake than before. “I didn’t do anything! That’s not mine, it’s my friend’s.” Mark’s head shoots up from his phone. He puts it away casually like he didn’t just almost call 911 again.

“What? Who's your friend?” Jaemin is relieved they didn’t just harass a random man for nothing.  
“What, you cops? What’d he do?” 

“Well, he might’ve done something. Can you please just give us his name?”  
“No? I don’t even know who you guys are?”

Jaemin doesn’t notice Yukhei’s leaned down until he feels his hot breath on his ear.  
“I think this is the part where you have to seduce him.” Jaemin is so taken aback that he forgets to whisper back. “No, it’s not. Seduce him yourself.”

It was a joke but Jaemin made the mistake of not being completely literal at all times when talking to Yukhei.

“So.. what are you wearing?”  
“I-I’m right in front of you, you can see what I’m wearing.”  
“Shit.”

Mark looks back and forth between Yukhei and Yuta before jumping in. “Could we at least get his number or something? We won’t tell him we got it from you, pinky promise.” He makes no move to hold out his pinky and Jaemin thinks Mark doesn’t really understand what a pinky promise is.

“..How about this. I’ll give you his boyfriend’s number. That way this shit is less connected to me. Also I hate that bitch.” Jaemin assumed ‘that bitch’ is referring to his friend’s boyfriend. It’s not like they can really afford to refuse so Jaemin passes Yuta a clean napkin.

“Thanks.” I guess, Jaemin thinks.

Yuta tosses the napkin back to Jaemin after he finishes. The handwriting is barely legible but Jaemin is a detective, so he should be able to figure it out.

“Can I go back to eating in peace now Sherlock, Watson, and…” Yuta furrows his brows as he presumably tries to think of a third famous detective. “Conan?” Jaemin offers, because of course he knows his fair share of fictional detectives.

“Yeah, I was gonna say that. Anyways, toodles?” Yuta flippantly waves a hand at them, his earring waving as he does. 

“Wait, what’s his name? I don’t want to seem too weird.”  
“It’s Taeyong.” Yuta simply replies in between bites of his croissant. Jaemin thanks him again and gets up, making sure Mark and Yukhei are following before going back to their table. Yukhei looks relieved that his food is still there, and rushes back to it.

“What if it’s a fake number?” Mark asks Jaemin as they both sit down across from Yukhei, who’s already started eating again. “Well, Yuta’s still there. We can just confront him if it is.” Jaemin starts to enter the number into his phone, because again, he was never one to hesitate.

 

_Jaemin: Hello, is this Taeyong?_  
_Taeyong: Yes? Who is this_  
_Jaemin: I’m a detective with the Lee Agency. Can we meet at the diner tomorrow?_  
_Taeyong: How’d you get my number? Leave me alone or I’m calling the police._

Jaemin looks up to see Mark grimacing. He then jerks his head back to his single cracker, as if he wasn’t snooping. Though it’s not like it really mattered- he had to tell them about it anyways.

_Jaemin: It’s important and it concerns your boyfriend_  
_Taeyong: Youngho? Just go to the flower shop tomorrow morning and talk to him directly. He told me he’d leave at like 8. He looks like this:_  
_Taeyong: Image Attached_

To be honest, Jaemin was a little scared of facing Youngho directly but Taeyong was seeming kind of scary now too so there was really no winning anyways.

Jaemin: Alright, thank you

He couldn’t help but feel like a pushover as he sent the message but he didn’t really want to carry on the conversation.

“Hey, we need to go to Kun’s flower shop early tomorrow. Like, 7:30 early. The.. suspect is gonna be there at 8.”  
“Nice! Mark, this could be the first case we crack! You’re pretty good Jaemin!” He grins, then stabs an egg on his plate. “Mark, remember that time you destroyed your dad’s eggs?”

“Huh? Yeah, uh- I haven’t really tried cooking since.” He raises his eyebrows and scratches the back of his neck. He’s a bit red from embarrassment and it fills Jaemin with affection.

“Whenever I eat eggs, I think of you.” He laughs, and what he said shouldn’t have sounded so sweet but it did. They were just talking about bad eggs, but it made Jaemin feel like he was watching a romantic movie. Like he was on the other side of the screen.

“Well, whenever I seduce someone I’m gonna think of you ‘seducing’ Yuta.”  
“Are you planning on seducing someone?” Jaemin teases, and he’s quite literally intruding now but he couldn’t help himself. “How could you seduce someone with your egg cooking skills?” Yukhei laughs as he takes a big bite out of his egg.

“N-no, I’m not. I could if I wanted to though. Some people care about more than food.” He starts mumbling towards the end, his ears and cheeks deepening in red.

“I think red reminds me of Mark.” Jaemin smiles, and watches as the shade of red gets prettier and prettier.

 

\---------------------------

 

Jaemin, Yukhei, and Mark are up bright and early, standing near a rack of colorful bouquets. They have a few more minutes until Youngho’s supposed to come. Yukhei is a lot more enthused about it than his co-workers, though.

“Jaemin, they’re still here!”  
“What is?”  
“The flowers that look like you! Didn’t you want to buy them?” And now Jaemin knows Yukhei is only observant when it comes at the cost of Jaemin’s pride.

“I thought you said they looked like my shirt.”  
“Yeah, but now that I see them again… it’s more like they just remind me of you in general?”  
“Oh? What makes you think I want to buy them?”  
“You staring longingly at them was a pretty good hint.” Mark says, and of course he was listening.

“I did not stare longingly. They are pretty though..” Jaemin couldn’t believe that even Mark had noticed. Was he that.. Infatuated? Infatuated with what? Flowers? Or…? Jaemin wasn’t sure but he was was suddenly filled with a feeling foreign to him. Something a detective couldn’t even put a finger on...

“I’ll buy them for you!”  
“Huh?”  
“I want to-”

Yukhei cuts himself off when he sees a tall man walk in. It was Youngho. Jaemin is almost glad he was saved from.. Whatever that was, but now that Youngho’s actually here he doesn’t feel ready. He’s so tall and.. Well, Yukhei was really tall too, but it was different. He shakes off thoughts of what that could mean and looks away. He couldn’t stare.

Mark was totally staring though. So was Yukhei. Youngho’s brows were furrowed when he saw them staring. He was walking towards them. Fuck. Wait, Jaemin’s watched too many detective shows to falter here. He’s also studied in school but tv shows were obviously a more reliable source. There’s one fault proof technique detectives always use when the bad guy catches on to them.

He leans in and he’s kissing Mark now. He was ready to stop and accept death at the hands of the tall man in the trench coat. But Mark was holding the back of his neck now, and what was Jaemin gonna do? Stop him? The kiss almost makes him forget that he’s in a cute, innocent flower shop. That he’s with Yukhei and there was a scary trenchcoat man approaching them. He almost forgets everything but Mark until there’s another set of lips on his. Jaemin’s eyes widen to see Yukhei trying to squeeze his head in between theirs and join in. Right. Jaemin didn’t think about how there were three of them and the whole ‘kissing to look like a random couple’ thing didn’t really work.

“Uh.. what are you guys doing?” Jaemin jumps back from the weird (note, not bad) threeway kiss and catches his breath.

“Um… kissing?” Jaemin feels both Yukhei and Mark gripping onto his shoulders now.

“I- okay, anyways. Did you guys need something from me? You were uh- kinda staring.”

Jaemin exhales before replying. He can’t hesitate, right?

“You’re Youngho, right? We’re detectives. Does this earring belong to you?” He holds out the sparkly piece of jewelry and watches as Youngho’s eyes widen in recognition.

“Uh- no?” This was going to be exhausting.  
“Well um- are you sure?” Thank you for the help Mark.  
“..Fine, it’s mine. So what?” Jaemin decides trying to figure out why that worked just wouldn’t be worth it at 8 am and is just grateful it did.

“We found it by this display rack. And the owner said there was nothing here before closing time… and flowers have been disappearing after closing time. Are you following me?” Jaemin thinks he gained the confidence from how easily Youngho caved earlier.

“...” Youngho bites his lip and lets out a heavy sigh.

“Okay, yeah. I’ve been feeling uh- pretty bad about it recently. I’m sorry. You guys win.” Youngho looks a bit shameful as he pointedly stares at the earring in Jaemin’s grasp.

“Oh.. that was easy.” Yukhei looks a little shocked. Which makes sense- why was that so easy? Jaemin gave up his first kiss for this (note: not that it was wasted)!

“Wait, what’s your motive? I need a satisfying first case.”  
“Motive? Yeah, I guess that’s important. Um, my boyfriend- he thinks stolen shit is hot.”

…

“What?”  
“I don’t know, he just told me he thinks it’s hot when I give him gifts that I stole. And he thinks flowers are pretty.” Taeyong a freak.

“That’s um- a noble motive, but we still have to turn you in I’m pretty sure.”  
“Yeah, I know. Can you tell the owner I’m sorry?”  
“Y-yeah, sure.” Mark goes to tell Kun what happened, leaving Youngho with Yukhei and Jaemin.

“Thanks.” He smiles a bit, and it’s clear now that he’s a lot less threatening than they originally thought.  
\---------------------------

 

They’re back where it started. That sounds a bit too dramatic considering only a couple days passed but they were very two very eventful days. Youngho is in debt to Kun, but his life wasn’t ruined over the whole fiasco or anything. He wonders if Taeyong would leave him after he stopped stealing for him. But he probably shouldn’t worry about other people’s relationships. Besides, he has his own… relationship(?) to worry about.

He wants to start a conversation by saying something like ‘I couldn’t have done it without you guys’ but he thinks he could’ve. When he thinks about, they really didn’t do much. But yet, he picturing everything that happened without them behind him felt wrong. They didn’t help with the case, yet they…supported him? Wait, did they even do that?

“Jaemin.” He looks up to see… pink. The azaleas are right in front of his face, and they shine even brighter in the lighting from the agency. Which makes no sense, because it’s fairly dim. Yet they seem to sparkle, reminiscent of Youngho’s and Yuta’s earrings.

“I bought them for you. Uh- yesterday, after we left.” He says after Jaemin doesn't say anything.

“You’re staring longingly again.” Mark smiles, watching them with the softest expression Jaemin’s ever seen on him.

“..Shut up.” Jaemin is smiling as he says it though- of course he is. He takes the azaleas from Yukhei from the second time and feels a warmth spread through him at the thought of keeping them this time.

He holds his arms out, and smiles when he feels two warm bodies against his chest.

“I figured it out.” He says, against Yukhei’s back.

“What?”  
“What you both remind me of.”  
“What’s that?” Yukhei asks, holding Jaemin as if he would leave at any moment.  
And unhesitatingly, Jaemin answers. “Home.”

**Author's Note:**

> this was p rushed but otherwise i knew i wouldnt bother to finish so oops  
> my twt is @markminism if u wanna talk abt this fic or other rarepairs i will accept them as the self-appointed rarepair mom


End file.
